WND EXCLUSIVE

What the? Now facts erased from schoolbooks

You won't believe what's intentionally left out from key U.S. date

Drew Zahn covers movies for WND as a contributing writer. A former pastor, he is the editor of seven books, including Movie-Based Illustrations for Preaching & Teaching, which sparked his ongoing love affair with film and his weekly WND column, "Popcorn and a (world)view." Drew currently serves as communications director for The Family Leader.

Specifically, the report details dozens of ways in which it contends the textbooks stray from accurately teaching about Islam, including the following list, quoted directly from the report’s summary:

The doctrine of jihad is omitted, incorrectly defined, inaccurately described, or understated.

Faulty description of women’s rights under Islam: The oppressive and discriminatory nature of Shari’a law with respect to women is omitted, mischaracterized or understated.

Omission or minimization of the Islamic slave trade, in sharp contrast with what is typically an extensive and appropriately critical examination of the Atlantic slave trade operated by Europeans.

Aggrandizement and elevation of Muhammad’s character that is contradicted by accepted historical facts.

Omission or minimization of Muslim conquest and imperialism, in sharp contrast with what is typically an extensive and appropriately critical examination of European and other imperialism.

False claim of Islam’s historical tolerance of Jews and Christians.

Misrepresentation of Shari’a Law in such areas as its applicability to non-Muslims and the separation of church and state.

False presentation of the Crusades as the cause of the animosity between Christianity and Islam.

Faulty historical narrative of the Crusades. Muslims in the Holy Land are commonly depicted as innocent victims of unprovoked aggression who were defending “their” lands against Christian invaders, rather than what is historically accurate: (1) that Muslims invaded and conquered the Holy Land centuries prior to the Crusades; (2) that Christians and Jews were victims of Muslim conquest and aggression centuries prior to the launching of the Crusades; and (3) that the Crusades were launched to wrest back control of the Holy Land from the Muslim invaders and conquerors.

Chronological revisionism of the historical development of Judaism, Christianity and Islam which incorrectly portrays Islam as preceding Judaism and Christianity and the Muslims/Arabs as the indigenous people in the Holy Land, resulting in the delegitizimation of Israel.

Treatment of Islamism as though it has no origins within classical Islam and Islam’s Holy Books.

Islamist Holocaust revisionism that attributes the creation of Israel to world guilt over the Holocaust and incorrectly maintains that Arabs were forced to give up land for the survivors of the Holocaust.

Omission of the fact that the United Nations created a two-state partition for Palestine, one for the Jews and one for the Arabs.

Omission of the fact that the Arabs refused to accept the offer of an independent Arab state contained in the 1947 United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine.

False claim of Israel’s responsibility for the Palestinian refugee problem.

Omission of the fact that the PLO’s recognition of Israel’s right to exist was and remains a verbal recognition only, contradicted by the unrevised PLO charter.

Inaccurate claim that most Middle Eastern terrorist groups have roots in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Omission of the fact that Islamic jihadists target Americans not only for their support of Israel but also for what they consider the “decadent nature” of Western way of life that threatens the spread of Islam throughout the world.

Failure to explain why the Islamic jihadists targeted the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and to identify the fourth target as the White House.

“Perhaps the greatest disservice done to students,” the report concludes, “is the net effect of the accumulation of these errors — the creation of a faulty historical narrative that not only misrepresents Islam but creates an inaccurate comparison between Islam, Christianity and Judaism, and between the Muslim world and the West. Regardless of the issue – slavery, conquest and imperialism, the Crusades, the Arab-Israeli conflict, to name a few – Islam and the Muslim world are not generally held to the same rigor of historical analysis that the textbooks apply to Christianity, Judaism and the West.”

But to many Americans, the politically correct nature of handling 9/11 may be the most surprising.

The report, for example, quotes the textbook “Horizons,” published by Harcourt in 2005: “On Sept. 11, 2001, the United States was the target of a horrible act of terrorism, or violence to further a cause.”

The report explains, “The statement that the 9/11 attack was carried out to ‘further a cause’ is left undefined. There is no mention that the ’cause’ was Islamic jihad.”

It continues, “Rarely are the terrorists identified as Muslims, and the jihadist motivations for their actions are omitted. Omitting these two critical facts leaves students with an incomplete, and thus inaccurate, understanding as to why 9/11 happened.”

ACT! for America Education claims it has sent the executive summary of its finding to over 70,000 state and local school board members nationwide. In addition, the executive summary contains a list of recommended actions on its final pages, for those who, according to Gabriel, want to “wake up America to what this report has uncovered.”